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Wednesday, 6 November 2013

India is set to
partially step into the expected void that will be created once the US-led
security forces start withdrawing from Afghanistan in June 2014.

On the request of
Afghan authorities, the Indian Ministry of Defence is willing to increase the
training of Afghan National Army soldiers, develop military infrastructure and
capacities of the newly raised Army in the strife-torn country.

The Afghan demand
for sourcing weapons, tanks, armoured troop carrying vehicles, helicopters,
fixed-wing planes, artillery guns and small arms, from India will be decided on
a case-to-case basis, sources have confirmed to The Tribune.

It does not mean
that the entire Afghan ‘wish list’ that runs into 220 different sets of
weapons, equipment and platforms has been accepted, but it is clear that India
is not averse to supplying weapons and equipment, sources said.

In no manner is
this to be seen as a precursor to having Indian troop deployment in
Afghanistan.

New Delhi will
want to wait and watch how the developments pan out post the US withdrawal. If
the democratic government holds itself in Kabul, military supplies will
continue, but in case the anti-India Taliban wrest control yet again, there
will be a re-think. Sources say as of now, there is no conflict in supplying,
weapons, artillery guns, tanks or armoured vehicles.

Pakistan and China
are also vying to fill the void once international forces, which had been
pumped into Afghanistan following the 9/11 bombings in the US in September
2001, leave the country.

The Afghans had
wanted that India to build accommodation for its troops, set up electricity
supply equipment and computer training centre for its forces. The MoD, after
consultation with the Indian forces, has asserted that infrastructure will be
key to sustaining the Afghan army.

New Delhi will
ramp up training and allow more cadets and officers from Kabul to come here.
Around 150 Afghan army officers are annually trained in the National Defence
Academy, Pune, The Indian Military Academy at Dehradun and the Officers
Training Academy at Chennai.

Also batches of
serving Afghan officers are trained in Signals (electronic communications),
counter-insurgency, jungle warfare, field engineering and management of
military stores.

A 10-member Afghan
delegation will visit India from November 19 to 29 for talks. It will include
Deputy Defence Minister for Policy and Strategic Affairs Enayatullah Nazari and
head of Afghan National Army’s Strategic Group Lt Gen Mohd Hamayun Fawzi.

Afghanistan has
been discussed between India and the US twice in the past few months. In July,
US Vice-President Joseph Biden had said “America and India are cooperating
closely in Afghanistan”.

In September,
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and US President Barack Obama, in a joint
statement in Washington, reaffirmed their commitment to “supporting a smooth
security and political transition.... remaining committed to contribute to
peace, stability and development in Afghanistan during the critical transformation
decade (2015-2024)”.

This summer, New
Delhi put a small medical detachment at Ayni in Tajikistan, just north of
Afghanistan and close to Gilgit, which is part of Pakistan occupied Kashmir
(PoK). This is a military hospital with doctors, paramedics and equipment.
Besides, 100 Indian military personnel are stationed at the Ayni airbase in
Tajikistan.

http://www.tribuneindia.com/2013/20131106/main6.htm

152 B’desh
soldiers get death for 2009 mutiny

Dhaka, November 5

At least 152
Bangladesh soldiers were today sentenced to death by a special court in one of
the world’s biggest-ever mass criminal trials for their role in a 2009 mutiny
and massacre of 74 people, including top army officers.

A total of 820
ex-paramilitary soldiers and 26 civilians were put on trial and Dhaka
Metropolitan Sessions Court Judge Md Akhtaruzzaman gave life imprisonment to
158 rebel soldiers and jail terms of three to 10 years to 251 others, while 271
were acquitted.

Touhid Ahmed,
former deputy assistant director of the Bangladesh Rifles, now known as Border
Guard Bangladesh (BGB), was among those given capital punishment. He was the
key leader of the mutineers.

“They will be hanged by neck
until they are dead,” the judge announced to a packed courtroom after a trial
that lasted 34 months.

“The atrocities were so
heinous that even the bodies were not given their rights,” Justice
Akhtaruzzaman said. Maj Gen Aziz Ahmed, Director General of the BGB, expressed
satisfaction over the verdict. “Justice has been served... The families that
lost their close relatives and people like us who lost their colleagues and
friends will get some consolation,” he said.

“The perpetrators of the 2009
mutiny have been given an exemplary punishment after a long trial,” Ahmed told
mediapersons.

Tight security was put in
place around the makeshift court complex on the ground of a madrasa in Old
Dhaka as the accused were brought in vans from the nearby Central Jail.

They heard the judgment from a
huge caged dock.

The paramilitary border guards
staged a two-day mutiny over pay and other grievances against military leaders
during February 25-26, 2009. The mutiny took place two months after Prime
Minister Sheikh Hasina assumed office.

BDR chief Major General Shakil
Ahmed was among those killed and the mutineers hacked to death, tortured and
burnt alive 74 people whose bodies were dumped in sewers and shallow graves in
Dhaka.

During the uprising at BDR
headquarters, the mutineers stole 2,500 weapons, broke into a meeting of top
officers and shot them at close range.

Among the civilians given life
terms were former BNP lawmaker Nasiruddin Ahmed Pintu, an Awami League leader
and ex-BDR soldier Torab Ali, who were found guilty of collaborating with the
mutineers.

The convicts returned to
prison under tight security while relatives of the victims and convicts crowded
the court complex along with hundreds of onlookers as Rapid Action Battalion
troops surrounded the area.

Prosecution lawyers said they
would decide soon on challenging the acquittal of 242 soldiers in the High
Court but added that it appeared unlikely.

"It is possibly one of
the biggest criminal trials in the world in terms of the number of accused,
witnesses and the people killed...it is unique that they got a normal trial
under the ordinary law of the country," chief prosecutor Anisul Huq told
PTI.

Court officials said out of
over 1,300 witnesses, 655 prosecution and 27 defence witnesses testified in
court. The formal trial ended on October 20.

Dhaka's then sessions Judge
Johurul Haque initiated the trial on January 5, 2011 under a massive campaign
to overcome the stigma of the mutiny.

The rebel soldiers staged the
mutiny at BDR's headquarter in the heart of the capital but the unrest quickly
spread to sector headquarters and regional units across the country.

The rebellion saw paramilitary
soldiers turn their guns on their commanders, shooting them from close ranges
or hacking and torturing them to death, hiding their bodies in sewers and
hurriedly dug graves and humiliating their frightened family members in
barracks.

The rebels went on a killing
spree during the 33-hour revolt, when they also murdered then Dhaka sector
chief Col Mojibul Haque and dumped the bodies of army officers in sewers and
shallow graves.

The mutiny exposed Prime
Minister Hasina's government to its worst challenge just a month after it was
elected. — PTI

Two-day bloodbath

Paramilitary border guards staged a two-day
mutiny over pay and other grievances against military leaders on February 25
and 26, 2009

The mutiny took place two months after
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina assumed office

The mutineers hacked to death, tortured and
burnt alive 74 people whose bodies were dumped in sewers and shallow graves in
Dhaka

BDR chief Major General Shakil Ahmed was
among those killed

Out of 1,300 witnesses, 655 prosecution and
27 defence witnesses testified in court. The formal trial ended on October 20.

http://www.tribuneindia.com/2013/20131106/nation.htm#2

Pak PM’s adviser Aziz to arrive on Sunday

Ashok Tuteja/TNS

New Delhi, November
5

Pakistan Prime
Ministers’ Adviser on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz is arriving here on Sunday to
attend a multilateral meeting and discuss with Indian leaders steps to reduce
mounting tension between the two countries.

It is learnt that
he has also sought a meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh apart from
holding talks with External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid on the margins of
the ASEM (Asia-Europe Meeting) Ministers’ Conference to be held at Gurgaon on
November 11-12. He is also likely to meet National Security Adviser Shivshankar
Menon.

Although no
breakthrough is expected during the talks, the two sides are likely to discuss
the possible date for a face-to-face meeting between Director General Military
Operations (DGMOs) of the two countries for defusing tension along the LoC.

Although the two
DGMOs traditionally speak to each other on phone every Tuesday, the decision
for a rare meeting between them was taken when Manmohan Singh met his Pakistani
counterpart Nawaz Sharif in New York in September.

Beijing:China and India began a joint anti-terrorism
drill on Tuesday, the first such exercise by the Asian powers -- which have a
sometimes-fraught relationship -- for five years.

The world's two
most populous countries each sent one company of soldiers to Chengdu, in the
southwestern Chinese province of Sichuan, for the "Hand-in-Hand 2013"
drill, according to Chinese state media reports.

The joint training
exercise comes even as the two remain embroiled in a border dispute that has
been unresolved for decades and has occasionally led to military standoffs.

In April, India accused
Chinese troops of intruding into Indian territory, a row that was only resolved
three weeks later when troops from both sides eventually pulled back.

"Since the
beginning of this year, China and India relations have scored new
progress," he said.

Indian officials
told AFP the country's contingent for the 10-day-long drill was 162 strong and
led by a brigadier.

"The joint
training exercise is a counter-terrorist exercise with a purpose of exploring
useful experience and thoughts, advance pragmatic co-operation, promote
friendly environment and enhance mutual trust," an Indian defence ministry
statement said.

The first such
exercise was held in China in 2007, with another in India the following year.

Beijing blames
"terrorist" groups for incidents in its far western region of
Xinjiang, home to Muslim Uighurs, and has in the past linked clashes to groups
trained in Pakistan, which as well as being India's great rival also shares a
border with China.

India and China on Tuesday began a 10-day
joint military drill on counterterrorism — the first such exercise between the
neighbours in five years — in southwestern China, with around 300 soldiers from
both countries taking part in exercises aimed at boosting trust between the
militaries.

The drills began
on Tuesday morning in Miaoergang, a town southwest of Chengdu — the provincial
capital of the western Sichuan province — with displays of Kungfu by the
People’s Liberation Army (PLA) contingent and the Gatka martial art, from
Punjab, by Indian soldiers. Soldiers also conducted weapons displays with the
objective of allowing the other side to become more familiar with the
characteristics of weaponry used across the border.

Over the next 10
days, the two contingents — comprising around 160 soldiers each, according to
Indian officials, from the 16 Sikh Light Infantry and the 1st Battalion
Infantry division of the PLA — will conduct counter-terrorism drills involving
tactical hand signals, arrest and escort, hostage rescue, joint attacks and “a
comprehensive anti-terror combat drill”, the Chinese State-run Xinhua news
agency said.

The drills — the
first held in five years — take place only a week after both countries signed a
Border Defence Cooperation Agreement (BDCA) to expand confidence-building
measures.

Chengdu is the
headquarters of one of the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) seven Military Area
Commands (MACs). The Chengdu MAC holds responsibility for the entire Tibet
Autonomous Region (TAR), as well as the middle and eastern sections of the
border with India.

The drills,
analysts say, are more symbolic than substantial: the counterterrorism drills
are nowhere near as comprehensive as a full-fledged exercise between two
armies. The larger objective is to expand confidence and trust between two
militaries, which are often grappling with tensions along the border.

At the same time,
the 10-day counterterrorism drill has been seen as being particularly
significant in China for two reasons. For one, the exercise follows the recent
signing of the BDCA during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit in late
October.

Also, the issue of
terrorism has come under renewed attention in China in recent days, after last
week’s incident in Tiananmen Square where a jeep carrying three Uighurs from
the Muslim-majority Xinjiang region drove into a crowd, killing two tourists
and injuring 40 others.

This was the
message highlighted at Tuesday's opening ceremony by PLA Lieutenant General
Yang Jinshan and Lieutenant General Vinod Bhatia, who headed the Indian Army
observer group.

Lieutenant General
Yang, the deputy commander of the Chengdu MAC, highlighted terrorism “as a
global challenge” and said, in unusually direct remarks from a Chinese senior
official considering China’s “all-weather ties” with Pakistan, that India and
China “face similar threats”.

“It is a signal to both sides
that the militaries can do something to improve the bilateral relationship,”
said Lan Jianxue, a South Asia scholar at the China Institute for International
Studies (CIIS), a Beijing think-tank affiliated to the Foreign Ministry, in an
interview with The Hindu. “As a result of the historical background, it is good
for the two militaries to communicate more with each other directly. The
resumption of exercises will help to increase confidence about the other side.”

Lieutenant General Yang was
quoted by Xinhua as saying the training was intended “to exchange anti-terror
experiences, enhance mutual understanding and trust, and boost cooperation
between the Chinese and Indian Armies”.

Lieutenant General Bhatia said
the exercise was “a perfect beginning” for renewed bilateral cooperation. “We
intend on learning best practices of each other, which would be mutually
beneficial for both the Armies,” he said.

The 10-day exercise is the
third round of the “hand-in-hand” drills that the two countries initiated in
2007 in Kunming, in southwestern Yunnan province. The second round was held in
Belgaum, Karnataka, the following year.

Defence exchanges were
suspended for more than a year, in 2009, after China refused to host the then
head of the Northern Command, citing its “sensitivities” on Kashmir. The move
came amid a disputed over China’s issuing of stapled visas to Indian residents
of Jammu and Kashmir.

India agreed to resume defence
ties after China withdrew the stapled visa policy, following the former Premier
Wen Jiabao’s visit to India in 2010, and agreed to host senior officials from
the Northern Command in several subsequent delegations.

Military ties were further
strained earlier this year following a three-week-long stand-off between troops
along the border in Depsang, Ladakh, triggered by Chinese soldiers pitching a
tent on disputed territory.

Last month, both sides signed
a Border Defence Cooperation Agreement (BDCA) aimed at expanding
confidence-building measures and preventing the recurrence of face-offs, by
formalising rules such as no tailing of patrols and widening direct contact
between military commands.

Indian Army chief
wraps up Myanmar visit with promise of further materiel, training

Indian Army chief
General Bikram Singh ended a four-day visit to Myanmar on 2 November that
officials said was intended to augment bilateral defence ties and neutralise
China's formidable strategic relationship with Naypyidaw.

Gen Singh
discussed the possibility of India stepping up materiel supplies to Myanmar in
meetings with senior political and military leaders, official sources told IHS
Jane's on 5 November.

He is also
believed to have agreed to Naypyidaw's request to station an Indian Army
Training Team (IATT) in Myanmar. This would be similar to Indian Military
Training Team (IMTRAT) that has been operating in the Himalayan kingdom of
Bhutan since 1960 and the IATTs established in Botswana and Lesotho in 1978 and
2001 respectively.

ISLAMABAD: Amid continued tensions with the US
over drone strikes, Pakistan army has successfully shot down a
"drone" during a military exercise that was watched by Prime Minister
Nawaz Sharif and army chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani.

During the
"Azm-e-Nau 4 Exercise" at Bahawalpur in Punjab province yesterday,
the army air defence demonstrated its anti-drone technology by successfully
bringing down a drone by targeting it with the 35mm Oerlikon guns, The News
daily said.

The event also
marked the culmination of five-year series of exercises jointly conducted by
the Pakistan Army and Pakistan Air Force at firing range in Khairpur Tamewali,
about 75 kilometres from international borders.

The drones are an
emotional issue in the country and the public opinion has been further divided
with the latest strike by a CIA- operated spy plane on Friday that killed
Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud.

Pakistani
politicians, except a few handful, have criticized the strike saying it was
deliberately done to scuttle the peace talks with the Taliban.

However, security
analysts and former military officers are happy that Pakistan's number one
enemy has been killed.

The drone strike
had renewed calls from some sections of the political and religious class to
shoot down the US operated unmanned plane.

Meanwhile, the
Prime Minister, who arrived at a helipad near the firing range in Cholistan
desert, was received by Kayani.

He himself drove
an open army jeep to bring the prime minister to the observation post to
witness the demonstration by armoured, artillery, air defence and civil
aviation formations of the Pakistan Army and firepower by F-16, JF-17 Thunder,
F 7P and Mirage aircraft to repel an attack of enemy forces.

Sharif said the
government had made its position clear that drone strikes constituted a
violation of Pakistan's sovereignty, were violative of international
humanitarian laws, besides being counter-productive to its efforts for bringing
peace and stability in Pakistan and the region.

He also maintained
that his government would not take any foreign dictation to determine its
national security policies, saying, the days when the country's policies were
determined through telephone calls from abroad are gone.

Allahabad High
Court dismisses petition on unauthorised activity on defence land

Six months after a
contempt notice was issued to a top Army official by the Allahabad High Court,
the petition has been dismissed as withdrawn following the court's observation
that "by no stretch of imagination" did it appear that any construction
work was undertaken in the cantonment area in violation of an injunction. The
verdict came after the petitioner Ajay Kumar Mishra, a practising advocate at
the High Court, sought permission to withdraw his contempt application
"conceding that no case for contempt is made out". A contempt notice
was issued by the court to Major General Bishambher Dayal, ex-officio President
of Allahabad Cantonment Board, on April 11 following the petitioner's
allegation that construction activity was taking place at the Polo ground, a
stone's throw from the High Court premises.

The court had on
April 12, 2005 described the Polo Ground, spread over about 23 acres of land,
as "the lungs of the city" and issued a writ of mandamus against
"making any construction" there and to "maintain it as an open
piece of land". On the date of delivery of judgement, the court noted with
dismay that despite having sought adjournments twice in the month of September
itself, the petitioner had failed to submit any rejoinder subsequent to the
counter affidavit filed by the Major General wherein he denied allegations of
any construction activity at the site. The court said, "The repair and
replacement of boundary fence of barbed wires for the protection of the ground
in itself by no stretch of imagination can be said to be in violation of the
order passed by the court, in as much as the same can not amount to raising any
construction on the land or changing its nature in any manner. "Notices
are discharged. Let the contempt application be consigned to record",
Justice Krishna Murari said in the recent judgement.

New Delhi, Nov 5:
India's foreign policy is "trapped" between the four lines outlining
its boundary with neighbours and there is need to find an answer to this
strategic confinement, says former external affairs minister Jaswant Singh. The
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP also feels that the "disarming of
India", or Indian men being made to give up the age-old practice of
carrying arms during British rule, has had a negative effect on the
self-reliance of citizens. Talking about his new book, 'India At Risk:
Mistakes, Misconceptions and Misadventures of Security Policy' (Rupa) Singh
told IANS: "India lies at the crossroads of four collapsed empires - the
Qing dynasty of China; the great Ottoman empire, the consequences of collapse
of that empire were diverse, which are never taken into account; the British
empire and the collapse of great Soviet empire. Each of these have left a
consequence which distilled itself into India's confinement between four lines
- the Line of Control, the Line of Actual Control, the McMahon Line and the
Durand Line. The book is an attempt to identify the consequences." Singh,
who held the portfolios of defence, external affairs and finance during the
BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government, feels that the disarming
of India and its debilitating effect needs careful study. "Post-1857
followed a great disarming of India - the carriage of arms, or personal weapons
was never as a weapon of offence but as a male adornment and also in a sense a
necessary identity," said Singh, sitting in his 15, Teen Murti Lane small
study, full of books, paintings and artefacts.

He recounted his
mother referring to his carrying 'shastra' or arms as a matter of routine
enquiry. "When I pay a visit to my mother, she asks 'Shastra to hai, beta'
(you have your arms, son). Why did she ask that, not because I am threatened or
anything, but it was routine in my part of the world for anyone to carry a
shastra. The British post 1857 disarmed the whole of British East India's
occupied territory, but not the pejoratively so-called native states. There we
kept our weapons, till almost the 1960s." Singh explains that Indians
don't really follow Mahatma Gandhi. "His non-violence was not really a
debilitating creed, it was in reality an empowerment. Still, do we really feel
empowered by non-violence.. We say we are essentially non-violent, but when you
look around at India today or in the past six years we are an extremely violent
land," he says. The disarming "is having a negative effect on self-reliance
of citizens. It is my personal view. During the Vijayanagar empire, six million
men were available for instant recruitment," he says. Would not arms lead
to more violence in society, with people resorting to using them at the drop of
a hat, like in cases of road rage? "That is a perversion. Road rage is an
urban sickness, 70-75 percent of Indians are rural," he says. "What
is that we need to do to make our countrymen and women's spirit more robust?
That is the question to be asked. All of us have been brainwashed into
thinking, should we go down this path India will go down into violence. I lived
my life, in a part of India in west Rajasthan, where people still carry
swords," said Singh. Singh also terms the 1984 storming of the Golden Temple
by the Indian Army as a "great sin" which should not have been done.
"I am not a Sikh, but I really truly think to send the army to attack
Harmandir Sahib, Darbar Sahib, was a great sin. It should never have been done.
It had never been assaulted after Nadir Shah. Were these (Sikh militants)
aliens we were dealing with? They were our own citizens," he said.
"Who promoted Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale? You plant the seed - ped boye
babool ke, aam kahan se khaye (you plant the seed of a prickly thorn bush then
how can you expect to reap mangoes)?" he asked philosophically. In the
292-page book, priced at Rs.595, Singh dwells on the 1999 hijacking of Indian
Airlines flight IC-814 from Kathmandu, which he terms as a "painful
chapter of my life, something that I don't want to revisit."